Chapter 1: The Mailbox Flames
The mailbox caught fire before Daniel even made it halfway down the front steps.
One second, Karen was crouched beside the curb, shielding a tiny flame with her enormous body. The next, a sharp WHOOSH sent orange fire racing across the underside of the metal box.
Daniel froze.
His eyes went from the flames to Karen, then back again.
“What the hell are you doing?!”
Karen straightened, her long, messy dark-brown hair swinging across her shoulders. Her oversized purple sunglasses had slipped crookedly down her nose. She didn’t look frightened.
She looked satisfied.
“That’s what happens when people refuse to listen,” she snapped.
Daniel ran toward the green garden hose lying beside the driveway.
Karen moved faster than he expected. She stepped directly in front of him and grabbed the hose with both hands.
“You’re not touching that until you hear me!”
“Let go!”
“She needs to learn a lesson!” Karen shouted.
The fire crackled behind them.
Daniel yanked the hose.
Karen held on.
For a moment, the two struggled over the rubber line while smoke curled around the mailbox and blackened the first few inches of the wooden post.
Daniel finally tore the hose from her hands.
“You burned my property over trash cans?”
He twisted the nozzle open.
A hard stream of water struck the mailbox.
Steam burst outward.
Karen stumbled backward, coughing, but her anger only seemed to grow.
“You think you can disrespect me and get away with it?”
Daniel ignored her.
He stepped toward the mailbox and pulled the door open.
Inside were several envelopes.
Some were wet.
One had been badly burned along one edge.
Daniel reached inside carefully.
Then he stopped.
The anger drained from his face.
He stared at the half-charred envelope in his hand.
Karen noticed.
For the first time that afternoon, her expression changed.
Daniel turned the envelope over.
The name printed on it was someone neither of them had expected to see.
And suddenly, the mailbox wasn’t the biggest problem anymore.
